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Thursday, April 14, 2011

National Library Week at Gould Law Library

Since the theme of this year’s National Library Week (April 10 -16) is “Create Your Own Story @ Your Library” I thought it would be apropos to tell a story about our library – the story of our move from Huntington to Central Islip. I conducted an email interview with Kimberly Barbato, who worked at the library before, during and after the move. Kim supplied the following story:

Q: When did you start working at Gould Law Library?

A: May 25th, 2005

Q: Describe what the library was like when Touro Law Center was located in Huntington. A: Prior to our move to Central Islip in January of 2007, Touro Law School was located at 300 Nassau Road in Huntington, N.Y. The law school was situated between Nassau Road and Woodhull Road in the former Toaz Intermediate School built in the 1930s. The northwest wing included the main entrance, reception, cafeteria, classrooms, bookstore and offices. The auditorium was located in the southwest corner of the school. The library occupied the east wing. The library consisted of two floors.

The first floor included the main reading room, the reserve room & reserve materials, the main collection, the reference offices & collection, technical service, a “New York Room” containing the New York materials collection, an adjoining “International Room” containing the international collection, and rooms 109 & 110 which contained the periodicals and printers.

On the second floor of the library were the state materials and statutes, the Judaica collection, 3 study rooms, a study “wing” (located in the bridge between the 2nd floor of the library and the school) which contained individual carrel desks, and the computer lab.

Q: When was the move & how difficult was it?

A: The move took place at the end of the fall semester of 2006. A company specializing in transporting library collections came in and moved our collection into the new building. As with all moves, it took some adjustment. We now had more room and needed to rearrange, straighten, & shift the collection to fit within the new stack space.

Q: How is the library different in Central Islip? What are the improvements?

A: We now have a larger, more state-of-the-art facility. It is because of this that we are able to consolidate our collection, accommodate students with more study space, soft-seating areas and study rooms (14 rooms, as opposed to three in the old building), as well as two larger computer labs including a SmartLab with state-of-the-art technology. Our Judaica collection is kept in a larger room with display cases and additional study space. The rare books collection also has its own room with separate air and temperature controls, display cases and study tables.